


Struggle

by AutisticWriter



Series: Harry Potter Autistic Headcanons [5]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Ableism, Ableist Language, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Autism, Autism Spectrum, Autistic Arthur Weasley, Crying, Discussions Of Meltdowns, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Multi, One Shot, Past Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-24
Updated: 2016-09-24
Packaged: 2018-08-17 02:06:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8126305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AutisticWriter/pseuds/AutisticWriter
Summary: Ron asks his mother to explain a rumour he has heard, and ends up learning something horrible about his father's past.





	

“Mum?” Thirteen year old Ron Weasley said, going up to his mother as she cooked in the kitchen of The Burrow. It was the Christmas holidays and Ron, who was already feeling guilty about going home when Harry was stuck at school, was being troubled by something.

Mrs Weasley turned her head, still using her wand to stir the multiple pots and pans on the hob, and smiled at him. “Yes, dear?”

“You know what a squib is, don’t you?” Ron said, a bit worried that this conversation might end with her yelling at him.

“Of course I do, dear,” she said, still smiling. “A squib is a non-magical person born to magical parents.” She paused and looked at him closely, obviously wondering what his motives were for asking such a random question. “What’s the problem, Ron?”

“Well, about a week or so ago, one of the boys at school said that Dad’s a squib,” Ron paused, tensing up when he saw his mother frown, but then relaxing when he realised that she wasn’t going to shout at him.

“Ah,” was all she said.

Putting down her wand, Mrs Weasley went and sat down at the kitchen table, and gestured for Ron to join her. He sat down opposite her, wondering what the hell was going on.

“I was waiting for this,” his mother said. “All of your brothers have heard it too; it was only a matter of time before you did.”

“Is it true?”

“Of course it’s not true!” Mrs Weasley snapped. “Your father went to Hogwarts – squibs can’t go there!”

Ron frowned. “I didn’t think it was true, Mum. I just wanted to be sure. I just don’t understand why this rumor’s been going ‘round for so long, and then I was thinking about how I never see Dad do magic, and I just wanted to know.”

Mrs Weasley sighed, and squeezed his hand. “I know, dear, I know. Look, your father isn’t a squib. He just struggles to control his magic. Obviously, his autism doesn’t help, because autistic witches and wizards struggle to control their magic when they’re getting close to having a meltdown, but your father’s struggles go further than that.”

Ron nodded, thinking of Hermione. When she was stressed, she almost seemed to radiate magic, and it sometimes exploded out of her wand and set things on fire. Neville was much the same. They were the only two autistic magical people he knew, but he presumed that the others had the same problems.

“You see,” Mrs Weasley continued, her voice shaking slightly. “When he was sixteen, something awful happened to your father. It’s a horrible story, but I think you need to hear it.”

Ron’s eyes widened. He was apprehensive, but also nervous. He nodded.

“Right, well, as you know, by the age of sixteen, your father and I had already going out for two years. We were very close; we used to write to each other all holiday. But that summer, your dad suddenly stopped writing to me. My parents wouldn’t let me visit, so I just had to keep writing and hoping I’d see him at Hogwarts. But, when I went back, he wasn’t there. No one I spoke to seemed to know what had happened to him.”

Ron looked at his mother. Her eyes were shining.

“Mum, are you all right?”

She nodded vigorously. “I’m fine, dear.”

Ron wasn’t so sure, but he didn’t say anything.

“I was desperate to find out what was wrong,” she continued. “And I eventually found one of his brothers. He was reluctant to tell me anything; he was looking at me like he wished he knew how to apparate. He just said Arthur was ill, and that I wouldn’t be able to see him, because he was contagious. I was kept in the dark for weeks; it was horrible.”

“How did you find out what’d happened?” Ron asked, intrigued.

Mrs Weasley smiled. “By being disobedient. Because my birthday was quite early in the school year, I was old enough to do the first apparition tests. I was a quick leaner and passed first time. So, when we went on our next trip to Hogsmeade, I went somewhere quiet and apparated to the Weasley house.”

“Mum!” Ron said, well aware that he was sounding like Hermione.

She raised her eyebrows. “Well, I’m sure you’d break the rules too in that situation. Anyway, I arrived at the Weasleys’ house, and knocked, and I met Arthur’s father for only the fourth time. He asked me what on Earth I was doing there, and I explained, and, even though he looked really reluctant, he still let me in.

“He didn’t let me see Arthur right away. Instead, he took me into the living room and proceeded to explain everything. He told me how Arthur had been attacked during the summer by a group of four of boys from his year at Hogwarts. The Weasleys didn’t know what had happened to Arthur for several days, because he was so distressed that he went nonverbal. But, once he could speak again, Mr Weasley said that Arthur told him that they called him a ‘retard’ and a ‘spastic’ and lots of other awful names and beat him up so . . .”

Mrs Weasley trailed off. Her voice had thickened, and her hands were shaking.

Ron felt awful to see his mum getting upset.

“Mum,” he said, unsure of what to do. “It’s all right.”

“I know,” she said, sniffing. “I’m fine.

“Basically,” she said slowly, clasping her hands together. “They injured him so badly with curses and just punching and kicking that he needed to go to St Mungo’s to recover.”

“Bloody hell,” Ron muttered, and he was surprised that his mum didn’t tell him off for swearing. “What happened to the boys?”

“They got arrested,” Mrs Weasley said, with a satisfied smile. “They spent five years in Azkaban and got expelled from Hogwarts.”

“That’s good, I guess. And what happened to Dad?”

His mother sighed shakily. “Eventually, Mr Weasley took me upstairs to Arthur’s bedroom. He opened the door, and I got to see your father for the first time in months. He was thinner and paler than before, but, other than that, he looked fine. I mean, he looked anxious, but he didn’t look injured. When he saw me, he got so excited, practically bouncing up and down on his bed; it made me want to cry.

“But then . . . something really weird happened. The room started shaking, Arthur seemed to crackle around the edges, like he was a fire or something like that, and he looked absolutely terrified. Mr Weasley cast a charm around Arthur’s room and hurried me downstairs, but not before I heard a strange, muffled explosion.”

“What’d happened?” Ron asked, watching his mum wipe her eyes.

“Your father had been so excited to see me that he’d lost control of his magic. It exploded out of him. If his father hadn’t cast that Muffling Charm, it could have blown up the whole top floor of the house.”

“Bloody hell,” Ron said again. He didn’t know what else to say.

“But, without a doubt, the second worst part of this story only happened a few years ago,” his mum said, taking a deep, shaky breath. “You see, as he got older, your father got much better at controlling his magic. He found it really difficult to cast anything more than the most basic spells, but he could cope. He only really had the explosions like I’d told you about when he had a meltdown or when he was really stressed or scared or angry. For example, he had a massive explosion after he found Fred and George trying to make you do that Unforgivable Vow when you were younger. We found ways to minimise his stress; we knew he wouldn’t be able to cope with going to work, so I went out to work instead and he stayed at home, and we tried to stop him dealing with anything that would make him explode. However, sometimes, he still got overwhelmed. But, as long as there’s someone with him who knows how to do a Muffling Charm or to calm him down, he’s fine. It’s never serious.

“But, there was one time when you were much younger, when things went badly wrong. I had to rush away because my mother was ill, leaving Arthur to look after all of you. I’m sure he would’ve been fine in a normal situation, but several things went wrong at once – Ginny got ill, Fred hurt himself, and Charlie almost got seen by some Muggles when he was playing Quidditch out in the garden – and he just couldn’t cope. He started to go into sensory overload and went and shut himself in our bedroom. He told all of you to stay away . . . but Percy didn’t listen.

“He was terrified by the sounds of Arthur hurting himself, and he tried to go into the room to calm him down. And . . . he got hurt, quite badly. When I got home, I found Arthur, Bill and Charlie desperately trying to perform non-magical first aid on Percy, who was unconscious and bleeding from a deep cut on his forehead. Arthur was panicking and I could tell he was getting close to having another meltdown, and the boys were terrified. You, the twins and Ginny were all down in the living room; I think someone had shut you in there because you were quite stressed. It was a nightmare.”

“I’ll bet it was,” Ron said, stunned. “How come I don’t remember this?”

“You were too young,” Mrs Weasley said, sniffing.

“It really scared your father, you know. I mean, I easily fixed everything that had gone wrong, calming everyone down and sorting out Percy’s injury, but he was so worried. He started wondering if he was safe to be around, and he started asking me if he should go and live in St Mungo’s. It took a long time for me to reassure him that he was all right, and that we were all safe as long as we planned things carefully, that things were a lot better now he was older. But he still had doubts, and, even now, it’s quite common for me to find him hiding somewhere, in tears, scared that the same thing might happen again.”

Ron found his eyes stinging as he thought about his dad crying. This really was horrible. He had no idea something so horrible had happened to his father; he couldn’t believe those teenagers hurt him so badly just because he’s autistic. And he couldn’t believe how badly his dad was affected, but it certainly explained a lot of things. It explained why Mr Weasley couldn’t do magic, why he was the one who stayed at home while his mum went out to work, why his meltdowns were so much more violent (and why Mrs Weasley or Bill or Charlie had to cast a Muffling Charm around whichever room he was in) than any other autistic person’s were, and certainly why he was so scared of leaving the house alone.

“Are you all right, dear?” Mrs Weasley said, leaning across the table and patting his hand; she had obviously noticed how rapidly he was blinking.

He shrugged.

“I don’t blame you, dear,” she said, “it upset the others too; the twins in particular were—”

“Why’re you talking about us?”

Ron started when Fred and George came into the kitchen. They both looked at Ron and how upset their mum looked, and they seemed to realise what was going on.

“Hi, Mum,” Fred said, and he sounded serious for once.

“Has Ron been having the Dad Story?” George asked, equally serious.

Their mum nodded. “Yes, he has. He’d heard the rumour, so I thought it was time to tell him.”

Fred and George turned to Ron, and smiled sympathetically.

“It’s not a nice story, is it, Ron?” Fred said.

“We found it quite upsetting when Mum told us,” George added.

 _I’ll bet_ , Ron added in his head, finding his eyes stinging again.

After getting a hug from his mum, Ron went through the house to the living room, where he found Dad listening to the wireless and wiring yet another plug. Mr Weasley didn’t hear him enter the room, and only looked up when Ron tapped him on the shoulder.

“Hello, Ron,” he said cheerfully; he was always cheerful when he was wiring plugs.

Ron almost didn’t want to take that smile off of his face, but he needed to talk to his dad. He sat down beside Mr Weasley and smiled back, watching his dad stare at his forehead.

“Hi, Dad,” he said, and he sighed. “Look, Dad, I need to talk to you about something.”

“Really? What?”

“Well, uh, Mum’s just told me what . . . happened to you when you were sixteen,” Ron said, watching his dad’s face.

His father looked back down at the plug in his hands, which started to shake. His face tensed up, and Ron wondered if he was going to get upset or even explode, but, luckily, he stayed oddly calm. Ron assumed that he must have been used to this by now.

“And I just wanted to say I think you’re really brave and—”

Ron never got to finish his sentence, because his father suddenly pulled him into a rib cracking hug. When Mr Weasley pulled away, Ron saw that his eyes looked very damp. Ron watched as his dad rocked back and forth slightly in his seat.

“How did I end up with such wonderful children?”

And the look on his father’s trembling face was what made Ron finally give into his long-suppressed tears.


End file.
